LUDLOW, Vt. – The Ludlow Selectboard convened for an online special meeting Monday, Jan. 11 to make corrections and finalize their budget after discovering a $106,000 error had been made in what they thought was their level-funded budget.
With the budget approximately $100,000 over last year’s numbers, Ludlow Municipal Manager presented the board with suggested cuts totaling $70,000, chosen because they “would not impact municipal services.” There was also $5,000 in additional revenue that had been previously overlooked.
Suggested cuts included $25,000 from the cemetery budget, $10,000 from the skate park fund, $10,000 from the Police budget, $10,000 from the lister’s reappraisal, and eliminating a crushed gravel purchase of $15,000.
Concerns about the amount to come from the cemetery budget were assuaged after realizing there were surplus funds that regularly rolled over into subsequent years, and they still had over $70,000 to spend in this year’s budget before the end of spring.
When asked by Board Chair Bruce Schmidt their thoughts on a final budget number, board member Justin Hyjek said that he would “like to keep tax rate as low as possible and not increase budget,” a sentiment shared by the rest of the board.
The decision was made to accept all suggested proposed budget cuts, which would result in a final number to be raised of $4,106,503, an increase of just 0.6%.